West is Best

Tuesday saw Wayne and me heading west and crossing over the Afon Llwchwr back to the heaven that is my home county of Carmarthenshire. We were there to pay homage to another westener - the Blue-winged Teal at Sandy Water Park, Llanelli. (Well, relative to Glamorgan, he's a westener whether he came from North America or Penclacwydd).

Even though I say so myself, I think I've excelled myself this time

The teal was picked up as soon as we arrived. It continuously swam up and down the northern bank, never staying still, and occasionally flying 20 or 30 metres. That's my excuse anyway. The Little Gull was still present too.

Mission accomplished we went on to Penclacwydd. The Garganey that had been around for a couple of days had departed, so we had to settle for Black-tailed Godwit, Redshank, Greenshank and a couple of Lapwing. Highlight of the visit though was a Short-eared Owl flying high over the marsh being pursued by a Crow. I've never see an owl so high up. Apparently, it returned after we left and was seen in more typical behaviour, quartering the marsh in front of the British Steel Hide.

A posting on BirdGuides of a Glaucous Gull seen at Sandy Water Park had us legging it back to our original destination. It wasn't there but it was good to bump into a gathering of familiar faces from Glamorgan who had just arrived - Mark Dutfield, Marlay John, Alan Rosney, John Wilson and Matt Evans.

We called in at Kenfig on our way home. It was still rather quiet there but hopefully, in a week or two, it'll be buzzing with newly arrived migrants. Roll on.